Post #24 When Others are Oblivious to your Engineering Life
As an engineering student you experience tons of pressure. I know this, and you know this. But the external world doesn’t seem get it. Your friends, family or professors can’t understand that all these pressures add up to suck the energy out of you. How is it that others are oblivious to your engineering life?
External Pressure
Your friends want you to hang out even though they know you have homework to complete. Your family wants you to visit them on your “free” days. Engineering professors probably give you two-weeks’ worth of homework on a weekly basis. The student organization you volunteered for needs your help planning multiple events or running a booth. The problem is timing – they always seem to need you at the wrong times. And you need to be in your apartment on a specific day/time so maintenance can fix your HVAC system. Then you find out you have less money in your account than you thought. And these things go on, it’s one crisis after another. Everybody wants a piece of you as you try your best to hold it all together.
Internal Pressure
As if all the external pressures aren’t enough, you remind yourself about upcoming exams. You anticipate having to work extra hard to make up for previous grades. But you really want to get your resume in perfect shape for next week’s career fair. Which means you need to have your best clothes ready to go. That may mean dry cleaners and ironing. Then you remember you scheduled an appointment with a professor the day before the career fair. And you wonder, through all the madness, how you can possibly please yourself and everyone else. Why can’t others understand how valuable your time is?
Engineers Get It
The engineering world doesn’t fall into the societal definition of normal. Unless they’ve been there done that, people don’t understand challenges and pressures of the engineering lifestyle. Have some patience for them. Remember they live in a different kind of world. Others are oblivious to your engineering life, but engineers understand. And I understand.
